Name: Boy George Doesn't Mind Being Called A Jerk | Letterman
Uploaded: 2023-06-26T21:50:25.000Z
Description: Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Boy George Doesn't Mind Being Called A Jerk | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2023-06-26. Transcript available.

Watch the stand-up comedy video 'Boy George Doesn't Mind Being Called A Jerk | Letterman' from Letterman on Comedy Buff. Published 2023-06-26. Transcript available.

with his band culture club my first guest had a tremendously popular hit called
do you really
want to hurt me their latest recording is called i'll tumble for you uh please
welcome ladies and
gentlemen the founding member of culture club boy george that looked very nice
that uh video as they
say thank you uh before we uh go any farther i was leafing through one of new york
city's finest daily
newspapers today and uh are you you must be familiar with the post right yeah i
spoke to them
yeah oh you did yeah it's my fault uh oh uh and it is a little article about
you in here uh looks of
dread greeted british rock star boy george and his dreadlocky braids when he
arrived at the a hotel
here in town it was certainly not a dunphy classic let me assure you of that uh
but you had trouble
checking in didn't you yes and what happened um well they didn't think i was
barbus treason they
weren't sure who i was you see and um they knew i was beautiful but they wasn't
sure you know quite
how famous i was so they said that we didn't have any rooms and uh it gave us a
lot of hassle eventually
somebody asked my autograph and uh they said you can stay here in fact they phoned
us up five about
five minutes later and asked if we wanted to stay longer so you know that's the
way it goes so they
were until they realized who you were they it was they were not having any part
of this huh well they
thought we were going to sort of throw the tvs out the window i think have you
ever done anything
like that oh no would you ever do anything like that no yeah uh also here on
page six uh
just hervey villachez is writing a new book to be out
in the post today oh and this one oh no i can't uh oh i won't even go into that
that's
uh anyway welcome to the show and i'm glad you got your your hotel straightened
out let me ask you
about your uh your hair is that those do appear to be uh dreadlocks don't they
sort of is is that
your actual hair yes and and you had somebody obviously braided that for you
didn't they yes
a friend done it now when you go places like we just mentioned in the hotel do
do people uh are they
puzzled by the way you look it depends where you go you know obviously if you
go to a country where
you're very popular you know where you've been number one then they they're
very polite but if you
go somewhere where people aren't aware of your kind of presence then they are a
bit rude yes uh for an
example what would be an experience like that that you've had well america yeah
that's right that's
right uh just one hotel though not all the hotels are that bad does it uh does
it trouble you a little
bit no i like arguing it's nice when somebody kind of gets in your way and uh
what do they what do they
say to you they don't really say anything they just kind of look you know it's
like getting in a hotel
lift with sort of three old ladies and a man you know in a suit they kind of
look at you and get all
kind of scared in case you're going to mug them you know but but logically uh
nobody dressed this
way would be doing any mugging because you'd be too easy you tell them that
okay yeah um but
but what do you say to them i don't say anything really i just say have a nice
day you know i'll
give them a nicer look back you know yeah i kind of kill people with kindness
in a way you know
the best thing uh how old a person are you i'm 22 22 and how long have you been
uh appearing this way
um since uh since birth you know what you mean my hat well yeah you're uh no i
mean you're obviously
beautiful you're yes yes you are that was the word
uh but you know what i mean at what point did you decide that this is the way
you wanted to look in
public um i don't know really i just did it it's a natural thing for me you
know i think maybe people
look very boring in the street you know yeah there's a lot of fat people about
and kind of people with
big noses and i just didn't want to be another person with a big nose you know
i wanted to be
someone with a big nose and a bit of style so that's why i do it uh and what
what kind of reaction did
you get from your family tell me about your family what what kind of what kind
of folks uh well my family
are very intelligent and they don't laugh at people when they're in studios you
know see and they're
basically you know my parents couldn't give a damn really you know i mean they
love me and i love
them i think most parents love their children whether they look weird or not i
don't think it's it's
really relevant to say you know ask what one parent thinks they can't they must
be very happy with your
success also yes you know now do you have brothers and sisters five brothers
and one sister and uh what
kind of things do they do your brothers my oldest brother is a welterweight
boxing hero and uh he does
that and they're all quite very sort of like regular kids really they're not
kind of any different to
anyone else you know but they have personalities which i suppose is what
prevents them from being rude
to other people you know i think if you have a personality then you don't have
to worry about what
other people are like yeah and they're kind of just like normal kids you know
very nice well sure and i
think people probably well obviously are always threatened by something a
little bit different and you
no getting around it you appear to be different from well with in new york
though i would guess
you wouldn't stand out that much i think yeah yeah i was gonna say that myself
yeah yeah uh you go to
muncie indiana though and uh uh we we're gonna pause here i want to talk about
the uh your music and
the group and so forth and we'll do that with uh boy george when we can buy boy
george is here tell
me about the uh the group the the culture club what's the the philosophy behind
the the group and the name
i think basically to present things that maybe would have raised a few eyebrows
10 years ago in a very
domestic way i think that the music we play is very acceptable lots of people
buy our records we've
had two number twos here and a lot of housewives buy the records although a lot
of people maybe don't
associate the way i sing with the way i look which is a good thing i think
because uh you know i'm
probably a little bit more honest than most performers i actually admit to
doing this because i enjoy doing
it so the philosophy behind culture club really is to create good classical
type pop songs you know
and we've just had rita coolidge recording one of their songs so we're doing
pretty well yeah oh no
no question about that but the uh the culture club isn't there also uh the
theory that you're taking
from several different cultures and melding it into uh a well the idea is that
you know plagiarism in
music is very kind of you know it's very strong but i think now that we've come
to a stage where we
have to admit that we steal ideas you know like rhythm and blues was taken from
black people and it's kind of
been adopted into rock and now we're kind of being honest about it and saying
yeah we do listen to
other people's records and we do steal ideas but we present it in our own way
in a very multi-racial
way you know and also in america there's a very big kind of black and white
separation which is now
dying you know i think people aren't really just playing black stations aren't
just playing white and
black acts and white stations aren't just playing white acts they're all molding
together i mean some
people probably won't like this but i think it's a good thing on the whole for
everybody yeah uh what were your
early uh musical influences uh who did you like what did you listen to um aretha
franklin and marvin gaye
smoky robinson gladys knight um gene pitney dolly parton tell me about gene pitney
now here is a guy
who who i listened to also when i was younger uh and then suddenly he's gone
but he's not gone is he
well i think there are certain records throughout the history of mankind that
kind of stick in your
subconscious you know i think if a song has a good melody line it doesn't
really matter who makes it you
know i mean it's really important that it's just kind of strong my question
here is he was very popular
in the united states and i don't know what year exactly and then he he just
left he quit but he
didn't quit he moved to europe right yeah but i don't he's not so popular in
england anymore you know
it's just kind of nostalgic people remember those songs you know there are kind
of certain songs that
you remember all your life you know there's uh so you you're under the
impression that he's probably not
recording anymore i don't think he is no i haven't heard about him um what
about your name boy george
what's the significance of that well again this is uh you know one of the
reasons why people laugh
because they're not kind of sure of the gender and uh i call myself boy george
because basically i'm a
very masculine person i'm more of a man than any of you anyway and uh basically
outside and uh basically i've just said that because um it kind of i like
things not being
what they seem i like people to kind of look at me and say that guy's a jerk
and then they hear the
song i like people to hear the song and kind of add another dimension so i call
myself boy george
because most people thought i was brooke shields and uh i'm kind of trying to
sort of you know confuse
people a bit yes uh now can i ask you a personal question uh regarding uh
gender is uh i guess you
answered it though didn't you this is not by any means to suggest that you're
uh on uh let's forget it
i just want something else uh uh now tell me what do you do for fun you
probably don't have a lot of
but i come on this kind of show because you know it's a lot of fun well that's
good i mean this is
wouldn't you know um but if you have time off you probably don't have a lot of
time off now do you
uh no not really i think that if you're a businessman and you want your
business to succeed then you
probably dedicate 24 hours a day to that which is what i do sure uh the last
time you had a vacation or
win anywhere what'd you do i've never been on holiday in my life uh-huh and uh
if you continue
with this uh hot success uh you would like to take a vacation any thoughts
where you'd go no not really
the main thing i suppose i want to do is write songs to other people i just
really don't want to have
holidays and things i want to keep working and be successful well you're 22
what they have kind of
stop people from laughing at me now now but you must you must know that you you
i mean when you put this
stuff on you must know you're like you said you like people to call you a jerk
yeah i know but i mean
i mean you know that they're gonna laugh if you go out yes i know they're gonna
laugh but but the
fact is they should also respect you as an individual and and certainly in
addition to that a fine musical
talent i think the main thing yeah is the music and if you're if you're
talented like liberaci is a
brilliant pianist so whether you may think of him as a person he's good at what
he does and you can't
knock talent you can't knock success well that's certainly true and you have
had much already yes and
thank you very much for being here it was actually a lot of fun meeting you and
i'm sorry i hope you're not
you're not a pill you're not a pill are you no no no uh we'll be right back
ladies and gentlemen don't you worry about nothing